All posts by Zelda

You know me. I’m a Democrat’s Democrat and I’m proud to support U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren. Liz is the real thing: a sincere, intelligent and progressive Democrat with the fortitude to confront the racists, misoginists and greedy wall street crowd. She’s an economist with heart and a truly Democratic economic policy for the working people of America that will bring them back into the Democratic tent. Her empathy is rooted in her personal experience with poverty. She knows first hand what poverty can do to people and she will fight for us like no other.

I’m thrilled to share with you that Senator Warren will be visiting Cape Cod Sunday, July 16 for a fundraiser at the home of Fran and Charles Rogers in Cotuit (molly@elizabethwarren.com for more information) and a town hall meeting at Tilden Arts Center, Cape Cod Community College, 2240 Iyannough Road in West Barnstable 3:30-5:30pm.

I know I don’t have to remind you of some of the despicable attacks the conservatives made against her character and even gender in 2012. We can expect that and worse going forward, and our Senator needs us now to help strengthen her campaign to combat these offensive tactics.

Please help me raise money to get her re-elected as our Senator by giving what you can afford (link to Act Blue). Small or moderate dollar donations make a huge difference in campaigns. I am personally making a recurring donation for the duration of the campaign. Small dollars make big differences when we work together. Please click here to contribute what works for you.

I look forward to working with you all again to help re-elect our Senator and Champion, Liz Warren!

A group called Catholic Citizenship has sent out a questionnaire to candidates running for office in Massachusetts not for endorsement, but for clarification of candidates’ stances on issues. This, in and of itself, is not unusual for campaigns to deal with and we gladly fill them out because Matt isn’t afraid to share his stance on important issues that affect our communities.

Catholic Citizenship claims that its mission “is to foster active and faith-filled citizenship in accordance with Church teachings and to encourage Catholic engagement in the civic arena.” There isn’t much about them on their website, but you can find out an awful lot about them by doing a cursory search at the Office of Campaign and Political Finance, which shows where they spend their money. For a “non-partisan” political action committee, they certainly finance a lot of republicans.

Last week, we received the Catholic Citizenship questionnaire with a letter telling us that, whether or not we filled out the form, they “may prepare position statements based on [Matt’s] voting record, public statements, campaign materials or other credible sources” on our behalf, which is troubling considering they would be cobbling together a 25 word (their limit) statement based on a Google search.

The questions asked by this PAC make it clear that the interests of their organization are based in hateful, fear-filled politics and not in faith. Their agenda is clear from their questions, seeking support to turn back progress and legislate with intolerance, bigotry and a lack of compassion so complete that there is no mercy for people who need help and protection.

If you do not believe that there is still a war on women, read this questionnaire. If you do not believe that the work we have done to protect the health and safety of women seeking healthcare, LGBTQ people in our community and the common good for our communities is not at stake, take a good long look at what this PAC, with no discernible connection to The Catholic Church, is doing. Make no mistake, they are actively seeking and supporting extreme, conservative legislators to take us back to a time when women were regulated and god forbid you or someone you love is LGBTQ.

We filled out and sent in the questionnaire with honest answers from Matt about his positions and why he holds them. We complied with their policy because we are not ashamed to stand proudly and protect the rights of women and LGBTQ people. We are proud to uphold the Massachusetts Constitution and stand by the good will taught in the New Testament (since they brought it up…), which tells us not to fear and hate, but to love each other. You can read Matt’s responses on the .pdf linked below.

We are so proud and delighted to announce Matt’s endorsement by The Mass Teachers Association!

“Educators can rely on Matt Patrick to stand up for our public schools, colleges and universities,” said MTA President Barbara Madeloni. “During his years as a state representative, Matt demonstrated his commitment to advocating for students. He can be counted on to make the right choices to help working families and communities throughout Massachusetts.”

We are proud to share that Matt has been endorsed by two incredible organizations: Mass Alliance and Coalition for Social Justice. Both of these organizations are coalitions of many groups with diverse and important issues and they trust Matt to have their back as much as he has ours!

As Democrats, we should be proud to stand in support of the striking Verizon workers and their unions, the Communication Workers of America (CWA) and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW). We need to defend American workers and the unions that represent them not only because hardworking people deserve a living wage but also because they deserve a dignity wage. This is not only an economic issue; it is a moral issue.

The income gap between rich and poor in the United States has not been this large since the early 1900’s. This income inequality gap inversely corresponds with the decrease in union membership. While the average total compensation of S&P 500 CEOs is $11 million, worker income has stagnated as the cost of living has dramatically increased. Verizon’s CEO, Lowell McAdam, for example, receives an annual cash compensation of $18 million about 500 times what an average worker earns at Verizon. A comparable European or Canadian company CEO to worker pay ratio would be about 20 to 1 prompting one columnist to suggest, perhaps corporate stockholders should be outsourcing CEO jobs.

It’s also more than an argument about wages. Verizon wants to get out from under the union and has designed their offer to reduce the number of union workers and provide less job security for union workers in exchange for a pay increase. Telling workers they will receive slightly more a year but also be much more in danger of losing their job entirely is the worst sort of corporate bullying, and we shouldn’t stand for it.

We must draw the line here. When companies that make outrageous profits while keeping their employees bordering on poverty, we draw the line. When companies can afford to pay a CEO millions of dollars a year but take away the healthcare of striking workers who are asking to be able to meet the basic necessities of life, we draw the line. When honest, hardworking people are backed into a corner and being asked to hand over their job security (arguably the most precious thing to workers), we draw the line thicker and bolder than it has ever been drawn.

This is a moral issue. This strike is about the future of American families. Over history, unions have been the chief advocates for working people, not people who want to line their pockets, but people who want to support their families. Unions brought us the weekend and showed us that when we are united—all of us, union or not—we create better lives, better communities and a better world. Without unions, we find ourselves in a never ending race to the bottom.

I will stand with these union workers who are standing up for America’s working families and I call on all Democrats to join us.

Matthew C. Patrick, Candidate for State Rep, third Barnstable District.

It’s Throwback Thursday and today we want to share this photo of Matt during his time as a Peace Corps volunteer in Ghana, Africa (1977-1979). Matt, pictured bottom left (I’ll get the exact placement) in the front row, taught masonry and brick making, but what he learned in the two years of his Peace Corps experience has been invaluable, especially during his three decades of public service on Cape Cod.

Volunteering in the Peace Corps taught Matt that, working together, we can accomplish much greater goods that benefit more people over more time. This is true now more than ever for our communities on Cape Cod and beyond. Part of being in the State Legislature is working not only with constituents, but also with other legislators from other districts and their constituents to initiate positive, lasting changes that help us create, nurture and keep strong communities.

True leadership isn’t simply charging ahead and expecting people will follow; it’s working with people to determine the best course of action and having the wherewithal to see it through. That’s what Matt has done. He did it as a volunteer in Ghana; he did it to help preserve and protect the Quashnet River; he did it to help get The Cape Cod Commission passed; he did it to start up the Cape Light Compact, and he did it for 10 years in the Massachusetts Legislature where he stood up for our communities on Cape and for people across the Commonwealth to help make peoples’ lives better.

That’s the kind of leadership we need; that’s the kind of leadership we know we can expect from Matt, and that’s the kind we’ll have again when we send him back to Beacon Hill.

I want to dedicate this piece, written by Zelda, to my mother who was mayor of my home town. Her two favorite sayings were, “Wash your face, you will feel better,” and “Walk a mile in their shoes before you judge them.” She taught me a lot.

I have been very fortunate to have some very good women in my life and I think it’s because of my mom that I accepted them as equals and mentors all of them strong and gifted. My wife Louise, and two of the best colleagues I ever had the pleasure to serve with, Mary Pat Flynn and Virginia Valiela and of course Zelda MacGregor, PH.D.

Today is International Women’s Day. Every year on March 8, we celebrate and appreciate the contributions women make from our local communities to the global communities. It’s a wonderful thing to do, but we should do it every day of the year, not just one.

The theme of this year’s Women’s Day is Step Up Equality. I could not agree more. When Women’s Day conversations first started almost 100 years ago (yes, that recently), it was called Working Women’s Day and it focused heavily on the unique contributions and struggles of working women in an economy that, to this day, is not very nice to women.

Women who work often don’t make as much as their male counterparts in the same jobs. Women who work often fall behind their male counterparts if they choose to have a family (and that’s when we give them the choice) because they are denied sufficient paid leave after giving birth, affordable healthcare, access to quality healthcare, affordable child care and so much more (all of this while being paid less than men).

It is an obvious fact that women of all stripes–whether they work or not–contribute to our society and, just as obvious, we need to send a stronger message to the world that those contributions are valued and appreciated. We need to recognize that a woman who chooses to have a family and work deserves affordable options to care for her family. We need to recognize that women who choose not to have a family are making the choice that is best for them and fully support their endeavors and applaud their contributions.

We need to pay women a fair and equal wage, not soon, not in 10 years, not in 20 years, but now. A fair and livable wage should not be decided by gender.

We need to provide accessible, affordable and quality healthcare to all women- everywhere. A woman’s health is between herself and her doctor; it is not the business of anyone else, especially legislators.

We need to stand together and proudly applaud the incredible and defining contributions women have made, do make and will make to this planet and we need to do it every day.

Unstructured sports, or pick-up games as we use to call them when I was a kid, are great for building organization, cooperation and leadership according to recent research1. We just picked teams and played, but in the process, we called balls and strikes, who was safe or not, who carried or made a foul on the court, touchdowns, pass interference and clipping, all pretty much by consensus. There was a lot of negotiating and if they wanted to, everybody played regardless of age or sex. This kind of interaction is lacking in the world of today’s youth.

It worked most of the time. When it didn’t work by consensus or when the older kids couldn’t settle an argument over a controversial call, it rarely–but only rarely–ended up in a fight. Nobody was actually hurt aside from a bloody nose. We learned how to negotiate with our peers. We knew what we couldn’t get away with on the field. It worked and they were some of the best days of my life. We would be out there, weather permitting, almost every day because it was fun. And as much fun as we were having, we were also engaging in the first real social contract of our lives. Allowing kids to navigate these social experiences and trusting them to negotiate with each other helps them physically, mentally and socially succeed.

When I mentioned this at the discussion about bringing new life to the Recreation Center, I never had a chance to respond to Sandy Cuny, who I respect and admire for her civic dedication. I wanted to say that the audience that might be attracted to this type of unstructured play would most likely be teens and young adults up into their thirties in the evenings. Young children unaccompanied by an adult or sibling would be allowed to participate in the evenings but might be better suited to a supervised session after school until about 6. This was the way it was when I first moved here in 1980 and it seemed to work well. Can it be resurrected? Now more than ever, we need a safe place for our kids of all ages to interact with each other in positive ways. Parents don’t feel as good about letting their children roam freely as long as they’re home on time for dinner, which is precisely why we need to dedicate this space to the people who have the best opportunities ahead of them: our kids. Let’s help them make themselves the people we know they can be.

My regards to Coach Phil Alfonso for organizing the session and all the parents concerned enough to attend.

Matt Patrick Testified at Cape Cod Commission on Behalf of Local Businessman

Falmouth- Matt Patrick, candidate for the 3rd Barnstable District State Representative seat, testified Thursday, February 4 on behalf of local businessman Franco Raponi. Raponi owns an office suite on MacArthur Boulevard that houses non-profit Community Health Center of Cape Cod and New England Baptist Hospital both of which are looking to expand to provide more services to people in need of healthcare on Cape Cod.

“Franco is an incredible asset to our communities. In this instance, he took an eyesore of a sand pit and turned it into a tax paying business that provides reasonable rental rates for two badly needed nonprofits that are important for low income families on Cape Cod,” Patrick said. “This location is on a major highway near a commercially dense area and it does not disturb any environmentally important areas. There are no wetlands nearby or endangered species and Franco is spending a lot of money for a new denitrifying septic system as well as highway safety and access improvements. This is exactly the kind of local business that we want to encourage and I was happy to tell that to the Cape Cod Commission.”

Patrick also highlighted his experience with the Cape Cod Commission as one of the chairmen of the coalition that got the ballot initiative passed to establish the regional planning body. This is the first time he has ever spoken in favor of any proposal before the Commission.

Patrick served as the 3rd Barnstable District’s State Representative for five consecutive terms 2000-2010 during which he led the charge to close corporate tax loopholes resulting in millions of dollars back into the state budget. Patrick worked with constituents on issues of public safety, health and clean energy. He also successfully fought for the Sagamore flyover to alleviate traffic issues at Sagamore Bridge and funding for Bourne to educate the children from the Massachusetts Military reservation.

Patrick’s platform is available on his website. For more events or information about Matt Patrick and his campaign, please visit www.electmattpatrick.org